The "onion sandwich" line was used so often that the media was leading with it by day four...

"Five days of sleeping in urine soaked hallways and living on ketchup sandwiches"

Which highly respected news organization came up that? ABC.

The following is a plausible explanation, not an excuse:

Neither ABC nor any other news organization had a reporter on board as far as I know. Therefore, they were relying for their reporting on accounts from passengers. Arguably, they shouldn't have done very much of this, because these people are not journalists, but it was a big story and they'll go with what they can get every time. And the more sensational, the better.

Making things worse, many of the passengers, I submit, were already counting their money from the lawsuit settlement. To their minds, the more gruesome they made it sound, the better.

Other passengers were just not mentally hooked-up to deal with adversity, which is kinda where this string started.

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The most dangerous man in society is the man who has nothing left to lose. -- Saul Bellow